Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis will announce his candidacy for the 2024 presidential election on Wednesday night in a call with Twitter owner Elon Musk, a spokesman for his political team told CNN.
The announcement, first reported by NBC News, will take place in Twitter spaces, where users of the platform can participate in audio calls, and the event will be hosted by tech entrepreneur David Sacks.
Ron DeSantis (Photo: Reuters)
Anticipation in recent weeks for DeSantis' announcement came to a head last week after his team said the Republican governor would announce his entry into the race for the White House this week.
Some of his supporters urged him to announce his candidacy for the Republican nomination as early as May 11 to overcome the growing national narrative that former President Donald Trump is the frontrunner by a wide margin in the Republican Party. Others argued that this date would be premature; Everyone agreed, however, that mid-May was the date for launching a campaign.
DeSantis has recently lagged behind Trump by about 20% in the polls. The former president's momentum began to gain momentum with the historic criminal indictment against him last month for business fraud and attempting to influence the outcome of the 2020 election by paying silence money to a actress with whom he had a brief affair in 2006. The growing support demonstrates the loyalty of Trump's voter base, the same people DeSantis is now fighting hard for ahead of the Republican primary.
Donald Trump at the New York Criminal Court reading the indictment against him (Photo: screenshot, Twitter)
To bolster his standing with the pro-Trump Republican base, DeSantis passed several laws this year that will surely please the far right, such as restrictions on abortion, gender-matching treatments for minors and sexual orientation education in schools. In addition, he expanded the death penalty and authorized the possession of concealed weapons in public — and the climax: DeSantis is waging a personal war against America's favorite company: Disney.
The slew of anti-individual rights legislation is part of a culture war DeSantis believes will help cement him as a replacement for Trump, his former ally. He is not trying to appeal to the moderate and rational part of the Republican Party, but to the same foundation that brought the former president his victory in 2016.
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